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Turkey PM: Attempted coup leaves 265 people dead
Government says 2,839 military personnel detained as coup put down despite pockets of resistance holding out in Ankara.
A total of 265 people were killed in an attempted coup that played out overnight across Turkey, Prime Minister Binali Yildirim said on Saturday, among them 161 government forces and civilians.

The army's acting chief of staff, Umit Dundar, told a news conference on Saturday that 104 so-called coup plotters and at least 47 civilians had been killed.

"Systemic operations are complete" against the attempted coup but mopping up measures could still take hours, Hakan Fidan, head of the country's National Intelligence Organization (MIT) said, according to a government official.

People have taken to the streets of Istanbul, lining the sides of major roads and holding the red and white Turkish flag in support of the civilian government and against the coup attempt.

Yildirim told a news conference that 1,440 people had been injured and 2,839 military personnel had been detained.

The permanent army chief of staff, Hulusi Akar, was freed by government forces having been held hostage at an army base in Ankara for a period, an official told Al Jazeera.

Speaking at a news conference in Istanbul after arriving to the capital from the coastal city of Marmaris, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said the attempt to push him from power was "an act of treason" and that those behind the plot would "pay a heavy price".

He said he intended to stay with his "people" and not go anywhere.

"Shortly after I left [Marmaris] I have been told they bombed the locations where I was," he told reporters. "I assume they thought I was still there when they bombed those places."

Speaking to thousands of supporters outside Ataturk Airport on Saturday morning, Erdogan said the coup plotters had pointed "the people's guns against the people".

"The president, whom 52 percent of the people brought to power, is in charge," Erdogan said. "This government brought to power by the people, is in charge. They won't succeed as long as we stand against them by risking everything."

Turkish president Erdogan says army faction attempted coup - complete speech
As he spoke, live footage showed dozens of soldiers involved in the coup surrendering on one of the bridges across the Bosphorus in Istanbul, abandoning their tanks with their hands raised in the air.

"Clearly the cleansing of the military from those elements who joined or supported the coup is already under way," Al Jazeera's senior political analyst, Marwan Bishara, said.

"This is going to continue for days to come, and I think there are probably going to be tribunals within the military to see who supported the coup."

Greek officials said a Turkish military helicopter landed in the city of Alexandroupolis, close to the border, and that eight people had claimed asylum. Turkey's foreign minister said the government had requested their extradition.

Bombs dropped on Ankara
There were still pockets of resistance in the capital Ankara into Saturday morning, an official told Al Jazeera.

In Ankara, jets dropped bombs over the Bestepe district, where the presidential palace is located, with plumes of black smoke seen rising early on Saturday.

There were also reports of an explosion at the parliament building in the capital.

Al Jazeera's Ece Goksedef, reporting from Ankara on Saturday morning (9am local time, 06:00 GMT), said the city had been quiet for several hours.

Military jets were still in the sky above the capital, but there has been no sound of fighting, Goksedef said, adding that there were only a few locations in the country where the coup plotters were holding out.

The prime minister said the military had been ordered by the presidency to shoot down planes hijacked by those involved in the coup attempt and that jets had been scrambled.

Officials said fighter jets had shot down a helicopter used by anti-government forces over Ankara.

Erdogan said that the attempted coup was the work of supporters of US-based preacher Fethullah Gulen, who the president has long accused of attempting to use his followers in the judiciary and military to overthrow the government.

Gulen condemned the bid to overthrow Turkey's leader, saying "governments should be won through a process of free and fair elections, not force", according to a report by the DPA news agency.

Earlier, thousands of people had heeded a call from the president to take to the streets and protest against the attempted coup. A similar message was recevied later in the day by many people in Turkey via SMS message, agencies reported.

'We will overcome this'

Turkey's history of military coups
Late on Friday, sections of the army had officially
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, saying they had "taken control of the country" as Istanbul's main airport was closed and fighter jets were seen in the skies.

Turkey's national intelligence agency MIT was targeted by hijacked helicopters but the coup attempt was "foiled", its spokesman told NTV television.

Yildirim also told NTV that a no-fly zone had been declared over Ankara.

News of the attempt first broke when army factions blocked bridges, fighter jets were spotted in the skies and gunfire and loud explosions were heard in Istanbul, the country's biggest city, and in Ankara.

The headquarters of state-run broadcaster TRT World were taken over and a presenter read out a statement from the group behind the plot, which she later said she was forced to do at gunpoint.

"We know they have been acting outside the chain of command," Cemalettin Hasimi, a government spokesman told Al Jazeera, referring to the sections of the army behind the coup attempt.

In Gaziantep, a city in the south, Al Jazeera's Zeina Khodr reported that supporters of Erdogan had quickly taken to the streets after he appeared on CNN Turk television urging them to do so. Cars could be seen streaming towards the airport, honking their horns.

"We will overcome this," Erdogan had said, speaking on a video call to a mobile phone held up to the camera by a presenter.
source, with the chart inside: History of coups in Turkey, is
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I put one part in boldface; related to
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"Cassad" wrote the blog
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about a hunt for Turkish rebels; in brief (according to that blog!):
  • more than three thousand people arrested so far;
  • the Frigate https://www.sinodefenceforum.com/breaking-world-news-iii-no-discussion.t7090/page-143#post-405930 is Yavuz (F-240), still under rebels, with the Commander-in-chief of the Turkish Navy kept hostage!! (would be
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    );
  • eight individuals fled to Greece in a Black Hawk, Greece agreed to extradite (both the fugitives and:
    Cnen7kmWAAEPTps.jpg
  • etc. EDIT let's see tomorrow
 
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B.I.B.

Captain
Any thoughts on what prompted the coup attempt? There has been some speculation that some sections of society in Turkey feared that she was moving away from secularism.
 

siegecrossbow

General
Staff member
Super Moderator
Any thoughts on what prompted the coup attempt? There has been some speculation that some sections of society in Turkey feared that she was moving away from secularism.

From what I've heard, those involved in the coup were even less secular than Erdogan.
 

solarz

Brigadier
Regardless of who wins in the end, this coup attempt exposes a major flaw in the Turkish military. Erdogan is not as in charge as we've been led to believe.

I wonder if the recent shift against ISIS is responsible for this coup?
 

Equation

Lieutenant General
Regardless of who wins in the end, this coup attempt exposes a major flaw in the Turkish military. Erdogan is not as in charge as we've been led to believe.

I wonder if the recent shift against ISIS is responsible for this coup?

Also there goes Turkey's application into the EU even after the Brexit incident. I think Turkey continue to be NATO's bitch boy though, just to keep spiting Russia and Iran.o_O This next few weeks politics will interesting.
 

Blackstone

Brigadier
I'm confident US would refuse extradition request under any other President, but this one wants to diminish the US, so I think he might do it. I fear Erdogan and his supporters will use the failed coup to lurch Turkey even more towards an Islamist country, and blame US and EU for the deed. Looks like darker days ahead for Europe and the Middle East.

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Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan called on the U.S. Saturday to extradite a Muslim cleric living in Pennsylvania following a failed military coup.

In a televised speech Saturday night, Erdogan said Turkey had never refused any request by the U.S. to extradite “terrorists” and invoked Washington and Ankara's relationship as "strategic partners" in an effort to force the return of Fethullah Gulen.

U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry said Saturday the Obama administration would entertain an extradition request but Turkey would have to prove wrongdoing by Gulen.

"We would invite the government of Turkey, as we always do, to present us with any legitimate evidence that withstands scrutiny. And the United States will accept that and look at it and make judgments about it appropriately," Kerry said.

Erdogan and Gulan, former political allies, have fallen out in recent years over Erdogan’s years-long crackdown on domestic dissent and Turkey’s once-open media landscape.

The cleric, who left Turkey in 1999, now lives in exile in a Pennsylvania Islamic retreat owned by Turkish-Americans and promotes a philosophy that blends a mystical form of Islam with staunch advocacy of democracy, education, science and interfaith dialogue. He rarely speaks to the media, but his sermons appear online.

“Turkey will not be run from a house in Pennsylvania,” Erdogan said in remarks earlier Saturday was quoted as saying by TRT World. “Turkey is not a country that can be bought or sold cheaply.”

In his own statement, Gulen said he condemned "in the strongest terms, the attempted military coup in Turkey" and sharply rejected any responsibility for it.

"Government should be won through a process of free and fair elections, not force," Gulen said. "As someone who suffered under multiple military coups during the past five decades, it is especially insulting to be accused of having any link to such an attempt. I categorically deny such accusations."

The Turkish government detained thousands in the military after quashing the coup attempt and reasserting control of the country's two major cities. Authorities said at least 265 people had been killed in the violence and more than 1,400 others were wounded.

Before Friday's coup attempt, more than 2,000 Gulen supporters had been arrested in Turkey on various charges since their split in 2013. In March, Turkish authorities seized control of one of Turkey’s largest newspapers, Zaman, which was associated with Gulen.

Even before the latest unrest was under control, Erdogan's government pressed ahead Saturday with a purge of Turkish judicial officials, with 2,745 judges being dismissed across Turkey for alleged ties to Gulen, according to the state-run Anadolu news agency. It said 10 members of Turkey's highest administrative court were detained and arrest warrants were issued for 48 administrative court members and 140 members of Turkey's appeals court.

Gulen preaches what many consider a moderate form of Islam. And he has regularly and stridently condemned jihadist terror attacks –much more so than Erdogan, say the president’s critics – and typically advocates interfaith dialogue.

Gulen’s movement is widely considered dangerous in Turkey. In Erdogan’s view, he is an arch-enemy of the state, whose followers represent a seditious “parallel-state” within Turkey.

Gulen is specifically accused of scheming to have his followers infiltrate the Turkish government for the purpose of overthrowing Erdogan’s ruling Justice and Development Party, known by its Turkish acronym as the AKP. Gulen also faces espionage charges, and two trials are now being held in absentia.

He is the head of a faith-based social movement that boasts a global following, has deep roots in Turkish society, and cultivates notable influence in the U.S. education through a network of roughly 150 secular charter schools.

However, a number of Gulen-affiliated schools have been investigated over accusations that include mismanagement of public funds and possible visa fraud.

Robert Amsterdam, a lawyer whose firm Erdogan hired to launch an international investigation of the Gulen organization, told Fox News in April that Gulen’s network has a history of receiving a disproportionate share of H-1B visas -- temporary non-immigrant work visas -- that allow foreign teachers to work in the U.S. He said Gulen’s U.S. charter network, however loosely organized, generates massive profits, and that “a percentage of that is going back to Turkey” and being used to foment “instability.”
 

kwaigonegin

Colonel
I think this is potentially a false flag for Erdogan to consolidate power and realigned his thugs. Turkey has remained relatively moderate for decades because the military has always been secular and kept the politicians in check however since Erdogan came to power and change the constitution to give the presidency more powers (b4 it was largely symbolic) he has replace tons of moderate military brass as well as judicial appointees.

However regardless if it was a false flag or not there is no doubt this latest coup will result in many more thousands of moderates both military and civilian to be rounded up, jailed and many would be executed.
It is 100% factual that Turkey has lean much further right since Erdogan became president and I think this latest event will bring Turkey towards a more hard line Islamic institution. Even on a social aspect things have gotten a lot more 'Islamic'. You see a lot more women in hijabs for example than ever before.

Anyway there already have been reports of judges, lawyers etc being arrested and some Kurdish villages have already been attacked by pro Erdogan forces.

What's scary is if you're a student of history you'll notice that this is not too dissimilar to Germany circa 1933,1934.
 
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